Waiting Game
by Darkwood
Summary: Sequel to Call of Duty. What happened to Wufei on L2? What's Sally's response? Story Finished. 122004.
1. Captivity

It is hard to remember exactly how this all started.

Trowa and I were investigating a hostile group that supported L1 becoming independent from the Earth Sphere Unified Nation. I recall being … distracted by Sai Lei's behavior. Over the years of working with her, she has managed to influence me more than she knows, and in the process, she has managed to prove her worth, not only as an ally and a soldier and a coworker, all these titles are somehow secondary to her worth as a person, as Po Sai Lei.

After Meiran, I had thought…

The door opens, and my internal clock tells me that it has not been the same interval between visits that it was the last time. My stomach complains, reminding me that I have not eaten in a recent while. It will perhaps be after the next visit that they decide to feed me again.

Being interrogated is a lot like sitting in a room with a cat, at times. Especially with the straight forward, hands' off approach that are being employed here. The interrogator wants you to be dependent and needy of him, to feel insecure, but tries his hardest not to let on that he, or she, I must remember, needs something that you are required to supply.

Like a cat. A domesticated animal retaining enough of its original instincts to be largely independent. A cat may walk into a room in order to be noticed, and yet completely ignore the person it is being noticed by.

This time the man, the same one I have seen every 'day' of my captivity, wears a clean cut suit. He steps over to the table in the room and sits down, calmly. His expression is empty, and as he looks across at me from behind his glasses, I am reminded of Lady Une. I wonder who this man is when he takes off his glasses. Thinking of Lady Une reminds me, invariably, of Sai Lei. I have often wondered why she allows people to slur her name to the English one she uses, but I have not said anything of this to her. It is not my place to do so.

Along with her worth as a person, I recently discovered a glaring fact I have been overlooking. Most likely something I have been overlooking for years now. I love her.

When in this environment, where someone else holds control over your space, it is important to remain objective. I recall there was once a phrase forgiving personality disorders as a 'sane reaction to an insane world'. It is very important not to have such sane reactions in this type of a situation.

The room itself is unremarkable. It reminds me of several such places I visited during the Eve Wars, and one that I recall quite vividly from after the Mariemaia Incident. I was in such a room with Sai Lei, at the time. Perhaps it was the preoccupation with that fact that made me so distracted on this mission. Perhaps it was the distracted nature that caused me to be captured by the group. Although I would prefer to be elsewhere, I cannot honestly say that I am angry with Sai Lei for sharing some part of the blame for my current captivity. I expected it to be long after Trowa was captured, if he was captured, before I was informed of his whereabouts, however, the news came quicker than I had assumed it would. And when I was told this, the expression on the man informing me seemed far too calm. I know he was agitated by something about Trowa. An easy thing for someone who has not adjusted to him, I will openly admit, however, something seems off. I have since written that off as an attempt to lure me into a mindset that will yield from them what they wish of me. I have no idea what that is at the moment, and so I concentrate on things that keep me from falling so easily into the grip of that mindset. My thoughts turn to Sai Lei.

The man seated at the table appears to be loosing his patience with my silence, and yet I remain seated on the floor in the corner, legs crossed, eyes only open halfway. I shift slightly, relaxing my arms and resting the weight of the manacles against the floor between my legs. If there were one thing I could change, it would be that I could have handcuffs instead of these blasted manacles. The only one of us… two, I correct myself, these were ever truly necessary on were Duo and Heero. Heero because no pair of handcuffs has been made strong enough to keep him from breaking them, and Duo because he always manages to get out of them. I've seen him do it. During his short, token stay at the Preventers after the Incident, he made a point of giving demonstrations to our coworkers.

I recall Heero staring at him with eyes more observant than I can describe, and admiring glances from the other uniformed young men and, occasionally, women he had grouped around him. Oddly, it was Heero who left the Preventers first.

When I close my eyes, as I am now, I can see her smiling at me, the bland, dirty walls of this room, the smell of my own sweat fades from my senses, and I can forget. I can picture her sitting in her office, working over some report, the sunlight coming through the window behind her desk and making her hair shine a little. Perhaps she's wearing her glasses.

After the Incident, Sally was sent to extend me the invitation to join the Preventers. Something I never quite understood coming from Lady Une. I was a party to a group that very nearly destroyed the peace so hard-won in the prior war, and a willing and knowing party to the rebellion.

I shudder to think just how willing I was.

I felt so lost after the battle, losing another cause in my life, and watching Shenlong collapse in on itself, the only reminder I had left of my Nataku… my Meiran… I was willing to follow the smallest twine that could lead me anywhere. Lady Une was smart to send Sally, whom I had trusted before, and not seen her more than twice during the Incident, through luck or chance I don't know which. The meeting, in MO-III, was brief, but it started the crack in my careful fortifications that let me jump ship before the entire scheme fell apart.

The look she gave me in the hallway, when my mind was ready to draw my sword and kill her, and my mouth to defend my actions by revealing her as a spy, caused the essential part to stop.

My heart.

I jerk upright, realizing that I was drifting off to sleep with one of my captors in the room. The man seated at the table, fidgeting, is familiar to me now. He was the one who surprised me when I was slipping through this base's fortifications, and also the one who brought me here. Undoubtedly he was chosen for this position, as my interrogator, because of the small initial connection. They have undoubtedly realized that I have none to the staff here, and am not easy to break. I have gotten, since then, a glimpse of guards outside the door, but he's the only face I will know and recognize when I get out of here. I smile a little, and see his reaction. He knows it as well.

I wonder if he has accepted the inevitable.

He straightens his jacket a little, and clears his throat as he loosens his tie. And the routine sparring match begins. As usual, he is the first to break the silence in the room, the stillness of the air, "Feel like talking yet, Preventer?" he asks lightly.

It is a game of chess we play with one another. But in this room, unlike the routine, it is I who am the cat, and I know that I am slowly breaking down my interrogator. Undoubtedly he will be punished and reprimanded for his failure to master the quick courses they ran him through before shoving him into this assignment.

I do not care.

I do not reply to his question, as usual, and he sighs, reaching up to take his glasses off and setting them on empty table in front of him. He runs a slightly shaky hand through his hair, and for the first time I notice the slight shake in them. He's nervous, anxious… feeling guilty about something.

He sighs, "You must admit, we've been playing fair with you up until now. We've only held you for questioning, mostly because I convinced my superiors that it wouldn't look very good, once we've gained independence, if we had bad relations with your organization."

I stare at him evenly. Even if, by some inconceivable method, L1 does gain independence from ESUN, they will most certainly not have 'good relations' with the Preventers, because they will have used weapons to achieve their goal. And, as misguided as President Peacecraft is, she is right in her opinion that weapons and war solve nothing. It is something that I likewise believe in, because I have seen for myself what comes of such actions. And even if this man's would-be government did achieve 'good relations' with the Preventers, I would forever be opposed to them.

Still, I do not respond, maintaining my carefully folded position on the floor, and he continues after a brief moment of pause. "Unfortunately, you are being most uncooperative," he says, glancing at me to see if his words are achieving the desired affects. My face remains carefully passive. He won't notice the changes in it as I study him. His posture. The slight trickle of sweat from his brow.

This man is an expert guard, a wonderful shot, perhaps as good as Heero when it comes to firing a weapon long range, I wager by the controlled motions of his body, but he will never be the tactical genius Quatre is, or have the patience Trowa has to wait out a prisoner's silent period.

I am not impervious to interrogation. Unlike Heero, I was never trained specifically to fight it. However… the man seated at the table above me is not trained to be an interrogator, and I did learn a few things during my years in the field. And from my comrades.

"So I have been unable to keep my superiors from ordering harsher treatment of you," he concludes finally. I was almost getting bored with his speech, he was being so formal and wordy. Much like Duo can be, except that particular American rarely wastes his breath on worthless topics in the manner that this man is doing. He stands, and steps over to the door, rapping twice sharply.

The guards I have seen only briefly through the door as its opened in the past unlock the doors and hold them open. Two nameless, faceless men step through, and brush past my interrogator, bending slightly to lift me from my shackled seat on the floor.


	2. Bad News

Since she's gotten back, Sally's been more withdrawn than normal, and much more formal. All of us have tried our various methods to cheer her up, even the new operative, Hilde Schbeiker, but none of it seems to work. I'm puzzled, because I thought that of all of us, Hilde would be the one to snap her out of it. Hilde's known Sally longer than the rest of us have know her, and they worked together quite a bit, from what I've heard, but Sally avoids her like a plague.

I hate to say it, but I think that Sally's a better person with Chang around. I never thought I'd say that I miss the reclusive, temperamental, egotistical, condescending Chinese man, but in relation to Sally's mood, I guess I do.

That, and he's not too unpleasant to look at, for the most part.

"Julia," it's Hilde. I turn and raise my eyebrows, the usual signal for the slim woman to start speaking. She glances nervously at Sally, and then motions me to step inside the break room with her. I follow, wondering what all the secrecy is about, and notice finally, as I glance at her in the brighter light of the break room, how drawn Hilde's face looks.

"Hilde, what's wrong?"

Outside, I notice that Lady Une has crossed to where Sally was talking with a few of our coworkers when we ducked in here to talk.

"Lady Une just got word about Trowa… and Wufei," Hilde says in a quiet voice.

"Ransom?" I ask, not quite sure where she's leading with this. On a scale of one to ten, I'm a ten at being a good office operative, and about a four at working things out quick enough to be sent on important assignments. I've known it since my Alliance days. If I had been in the same situation as Sally, I most likely wouldn't have made it out alive. I'm not… that type.

Hilde makes a slightly displeased face, as though my suggestion just left a bad taste in her mouth, and she gives me a flat look that says I should know what she's implying without having to be told. I spread my hands, surrendering to the obvious. I simply don't know what she's trying to say.

"We're not quite sure," she says in a quiet voice, her words hushed and uncertain. "Perhaps someone attacked the colony government from within, or maybe…" she sighs, "we can't be sure."

"Hilde?" my voice is just as tenuous as hers is.

Exasperated, Hilde runs her fingers through her glossy black hair. I cough, hoping to prompt her to go on, and after a moment of pause, and cat-like indifference, she says, "They were being held by the organization on L1 that was trying to gain independence from the Nation."

"That was almost obvious… were?"

Sally walks by the break room, an obvious mess, her hand clamped over her mouth. She moves very quickly for her office, and closes the door, hard, behind her. If I'm not mistaken, there were tears in her eyes.

"The group was attacked," Hilde says quietly, eyes trailing after the taller blond woman remorsefully. "As of right now there are no confirmed survivors."

"No… survivors?" my voice is empty.

Hilde collects herself, and nods once, going to get herself a cup of tea before heading to the door. I lean back against the break room couch and try to catch my breath. "Everyone's being informed… I… wasn't sure Sally had heard yet. Lady Une… wanted to be the one to tell her."

Without another word, she leaves the break room, and me to silence and my own thoughts. For the first time, I'm forced to consider…

They might not be coming back.

I didn't know either of them that well, but the idea that coworkers are… dead… unsettles me too much, and I have to lean against the counter to catch my breath.

We were often told about methods of torture, all of us had a briefing session on it before we were moved up to investigator, and it's something that I would never be strong enough to endure, I am sure of it. I can hardly handle missing my morning coffee and bagel without enough anxiety to kill a small horse.

The idea of actually undergoing torture… I raise a hand to my forehead and sink down against the back of the couch, my chin pointing to the ceiling. Soft, hesitant footsteps at the door make me look up.

"Julia?" a heavily accented voice asks, timidly. For all his bulk and imposing nature, Vladimir was tamer than a kitten, when it came to his coworkers and friends. Of all the people that could have walked into the break room, I am glad that he is the one to have caught me at such a weak point. Vlad… I… can trust him.

*

Hilde glances over her shoulder, halfway to turning back to comfort Julia when she sees Vladimir in the doorway. Contented that her coworker would be all right, she numbly started her way back to her own small office. She had been shoved into a new corner once she got promoted, but she doesn't complain about the cramped space.

A part of her wants to go and console Sally, but she simply cannot bring herself to, because she knows better. She had gone through the same kind of inconsolable hurt when Duo…

Swallowing the lump in her throat, Hilde turns her back on the hallway leading towards the offices and heads to the elevator. Hard news like this always required the same sort of consoling.

The quiet noises of sadness coming from the Chinese Preventer's office do not go unnoticed by the dark haired young woman, she simply thinks better of her ability to comfort them away.


	3. Rude Awakening

Three days ago, I got the news. Lady Une was very nice to tell me herself that the two of them are missing, and even nicer to send me home from work early.

I haven't had the heart to go back to work just yet. I haven't gotten out of bed, and my stomach is complaining. I haven't left the apartment and my ravenous stomach has visions of a refrigerator filled with food gone rotten. The milk must be sour and the eggs spoiled, by now.

But I can't quite bring myself to get out of bed.

There was a knock on my door yesterday, a timid one. I ignored it. If they really cared, they would not have left so easily. It must have been Hilde.

She has good intentions, but she lacks the heart to carry them through.

It hurts to sleep, because closing my eyes brings images of his ebony hair, and opening them I feel his eyes upon me. I think I may be going crazy from it. I never knew it was possible to miss someone so much.

There is a pounding on my door, much more insistent than the knock I remember before, and I make a move to answer, but find I'm too tired to get out of bed. "Who is it?" I call weakly, not having noticed how weakly until now.

"Sally!" the voice on the other side of the door is worried, concerned, and though it has obviously been speaking English for a long time, I can still detect a slight accent to the name. For half a second, at the sound of my name called urgently by the voice, I dare to hope that it is the man have fallen ill for, but as my name is called again, I realize it can't be him. Someone much less beloved, and more familiar.

There is the noise of a thud, and the door is knocked open. Leave it to Heero to find the most direct path into any situation. He appears in the doorway shortly after the noise and the glare on his face is a very serious one.

"Hi," I offer weakly, turning slightly and pulling the covers up over myself.

"That's all you have to say," he states the obvious, as always. He's either got the best observational skills or too dense to think through his words before using them. On careful reflection, I find that it must be the former.

He's too skilled and pensive for it to be as simple as a lack of attentiveness, although in the past he was unfeeling enough to let it simply be that. He crosses to the bed and yanks the covers off of me, exposing my barely clad body to the chill in the air and I let out a startled yip and glare at him.

Our blue eyes meet and after a clash, I fold. His eyes are harder than mine are. He is stronger than me. "Get up," he says simply.

I hesitate, unsure of how to say to him that I don't think that I can, and again I wonder what Duo must've felt when faced with the same stony glare and the same unmoving wall that he can make himself. And then he reaches forward, and I realize he is not unmoving, just without a forgiving nature.

Like a tsunami.

He grabs me roughly by the wrist and drags me into a sitting position. "Heero!" I snap, slapping at his wrist with my free hand. "Let go."

"Make me," he says with a challenging look in his eye. He was never this demanding of me before. Perhaps what happened on L1 was a mistake. Perhaps I never should have…

"Why are you acting this way?" I ask, feeling sick to my stomach and slightly dizzy. I did not know this was what it felt like to be wasting away, that death could feel this slow and unforgiving. "Leave me alone."

There is a growl in the room and for a moment it doesn't seem to be coming from him. And then, as he jerks me closer to him, one steely strong arm latching around my waist to drag me to my feet, I hear it from his throat, and feel the rumble of it in my chest that's pressed against his. "Foolish woman," he snaps at me, eyes dangerously dark as he stares into mine, the slight difference in our heights not enough to impede his dominance over me.

"How-" I start to protest.

"You've given up on him." He helps me easily to the bathroom, mostly carrying my weak body. "It's a mistake I made with Duo, and not one that I intend to let you make with Wufei."

My breath catches in my throat. "Heero… there's nothing… nothing left to give up on," I feel tears stinging my eyes, and he falls silent. "No survivors, Une said."

Gently, he lets go of my wrist, a slight chuckle in his voice, and brushes the tears from my eyes, almost tenderly. "And since when was Lady Une ever the authority on a Gundam pilot?" he asks softly. "Take a shower and get dressed… we've got to talk."

***

Mind reeling, I let the warm water of the shower cascade over my face, breathing deeply and carefully into the stream of liquid as it brushes away the fatigue and sweat of the past few days. Nothing like Heero to restore my faith enough to keep me moving on.

He did it during the wars, and apparently he hasn't given up that post as easily as he's given up fighting. Or appears to have given up fighting. With the density of muscle he still has in those arms, and that chest… I have to wonder. It certainly wasn't him we were fighting on either L1 or L2, or anyone he was working on… but the possibility that he's still fighting exists.

I can't ignore that.

But-

A thought strikes me.

That would be betraying Duo, whom, from what I can tell, has sincerely given up fighting as an option. My thoughts stray and I find my closed eyes feel as though they are being touched by gentle fingertips.

***

I open my eyes and find a dimly lit room. The last thing I remember is an explosion and the noise of footsteps running down the corridor outside the room. And then a brilliant flash of light and nothing but darkness. I can barely make out the shapes.

"So you are awake," a familiar voice says.

I blink and turn my head, looking for my new captor, but realize several things almost at once. There are no bars in this room that I can make out, and no captor would put me to bed, much less be mindful of my eyes. "A friend," I say weakly, and sink back against the pillow. "Who?"

"I'm completely shocked you don't remember my voice, Fei," the speaker says, "you spent a full two years trying to get me to shut up. I thought it was something you'd never forget."

***

I hear a voice and tilt my head, hoping to hear the distant one of a man I've never spoken truthfully to, but am only slightly surprised to hear Heero asking if I am all right and what I need to get ready.

"A towel," I reply, "and a little peace and quiet from you."

He chuckles, and I wonder, again, how Duo could've left him, as human as he's become. I turn off the water, raking my hair over my shoulder, and reach for a towel, wrapping it securely around myself before tucking my hair in another one and wiping the mirror off with a hand.

The steam on the glass from the water disappears, revealing my reflection, and I take a step back. The despair seems written on my face… etched in by three days of inactivity, and I am surprised at the change in my appearance. There are bags under my eyes, and my cheeks appear thin. My hair looks paler than I am used to, and my skin as well.

But my eyes…

Heero has put hope back into them, with his very presence… with his… care.

I shake the water from my hair and braid it quickly, going through the motions and dressing in the jeans and tee-shirt that Heero put into the bathroom for me after I got into the shower. I try my hardest not to look into the mirror as I head back out to talk with the stoic Japanese man.

***

"You…" I blink my eyes, finding it hard to see properly through them to make out the details of what I am sure must be a familiar face.

"The one and only," the same cocky voice says, and I find a smile tilting my lips. "Had yourself in quite a pickle that time, huh Fei?"

"Trowa, is he-"

"Resting comfortably, unharmed." I see a pair of pale hands reach up and toy with the end of what looks like a long brown rope that I am certain is a braid. "We're on our way to somewhere you can get those eyes looked at properly… I'm afraid I might have permanently damaged them, despite my heroic intentions."

"Being alive is better than otherwise," I say, relaxing on the bed, closing my weary eyes thankfully. "Does anyone know what really happened?" I certainly do not. As much as I would love to claim omniscience, I cannot, and will not.

"Reports have simply stated the place was attacked, and no survivors have been found." The voice is coming closer, and I hear the rustle of clothing as he kneels next to the bed. His fingertips are slightly cool as they gently brush across my eyelids. "Is there someone I should notify in your case, Fei?"

"Sai Lei," I say softly. "I do not want her to think that-"

His fingertips drift from my eyelids to rub gentle circles into my temples, and his voice almost makes me question his intent in saving us, "I'll see to it she gets the message… there's someone in London I've been meaning to contact for a while now." And as simple as that, he slips his hands from my face, and I hear the noise of his footsteps as he crosses the room, the gentle whoosh of the door telling me the sensors have opened it, and the scent of the sterile room decreasing to let me know the air flow has increased.

"Try to get some rest, Fei… it's been a long trip."

Indeed it has, I think to myself, yawning slightly. Tiring as well… especially with his presence. In truth I never disliked him… it was just too easy to let him steal the energy from a room for me to be calm and comfortable with him in the room… the same as with Heero, only for different reasons.

With Heero it was like the force of two mountains pushing against one another… there was no room for give on either side. We were too alike.

And, I think that now, so are they.


	4. Informed

"So, what was it that you wanted to talk to me about?" I ask, towel warm around my neck in the heat of the kitchen. He's made tea and is bringing it over to sit across from me.

"Wufei isn't dead."

My eyes sting again. I thought, after a day and a half of crying that I was out of tears left to cry, but the certainty in Heero's voice brings me right back to the brink of my former tears and threatens to throw me straight into them again.

Lady Une said that there weren't any survivors. She's never lied to me before, I don't see why she would be lying to me now…

As though reading my mind, he sets the mug in front of me and says, "She's not lying, she just doesn't know any other truth to tell you."

"And you do?" I snap, irritable.

The long pause in the air is what makes me reconsider, looking up from my teacup to stare at him, mouth slightly open. I swallow the lump in my throat.

His eyes, cold and hard, meet mine, and it's like running smack into a brick wall.

"… do you?"

But he doesn't respond to my question, instead, he stands and picks his jacket up off of the chair. "Drink your tea. And make yourself something to eat, I'll be back tomorrow." He pulls on the jacket, his dark hair messy against the collar as he flips it up against the chill outside.

I don't get a chance to say anything more before he's disappeared through the door, but the second I hear it shut snugly, it's as though someone has opened a set of blinds and let the sunshine into my day. If you're trying to read Heero, you can stop, but he rarely leads you to believe anything he doesn't mean.

Calculating bastard, he is.

But I can overlook that for the moment, because Wufei is alive. He hasn't said as much, but he may as well have. I stand and head over to the refrigerator, amused but not overly surprised to find that there's food in it.

Heero must be very intent on seeing me back in top form. Or else someone told him to make sure I was taking care of myself.

***

"I'm no doctor, Fei… but from what I've looked up, your eyesight will come back when it wants to, and not before."

The concept of being less than whole, at one point, would have been much more disturbing than death. But now, something's changed.

During the war, I was obsessed, preoccupied with perfection, and I held myself to a standard that was impossible for anyone to uphold. All that mattered to me was the people I felt I had let down. The clan whose entire line culminated in my life. It was easy to feel unworthy in such circumstances, far too easy. And I weakly allowed myself to fall into that feeling of unworthiness, which is why I couldn't really forgive myself for Meiran's death. And why I punished myself for so long.

The other people I worked around at the Preventers could see it in me, my inability to forgive myself. Even if they did not know that they could. People act often on their instincts, and they treated me how I gave them reason to treat me. It is that simple.

Now I have another reason to go on. One that is much simpler than a clan and traditions that I have to maintain, one that has less responsibility, and yet a greater one.

"That does not disturb me," I reply, finally, finishing dressing in the clothes he's brought for me. "I can see enough to move about, and anything else that I require can be taken care of."

I swallow, slightly. I very much doubt that Sally will care that my eyes are not perfect; she isn't concerned with such things. I do not believe that she feels what she feels for me because of my eyesight, and I hope that it will not influence her feelings that it is no longer perfect.

There is a long silence in the room, one in which not even Trowa utters a word.

"You've changed," Duo says, and though I can't see his face, I can tell that there's an approving smile there, by the texture of his voice in my ears. "We'll be docking shortly. The two of you will transfer over to your transport to earth from the port."

"Duo," Trowa speaks up for the first time since entering the room. "Aren't you going to come down and see… him?"

The figure I can make out before me stiffens, and I notice that Trowa stills again. None of us are exactly sure what happened between Duo and Heero, but we do know that it led to Duo moving back to the colonies from earth, and leaving Heero alone.

It was shortly after the Incident. And neither of them spoke to any of us about it. Quatre and Trowa managed to last a bit longer… but not by much. Trowa and Quatre splitting up I can understand. Quatre felt the strains of his obligations at Winner Corporation. And the desire, that he spoke to me of a few times, to start a family of his own.

A desire that did not echo in Trowa, who knew only of responsibility in family, and no joy. When they split up, Heero's response was that it would not be permanent.

I remember his words, and the far off look in his eyes as he said them. _"Love is more important than some things."_ Undoubtedly, he was thinking about something between he and Duo.

"No," he replies, turning towards the door. "He doesn't want to see me. Not now."

"That's a lie," I hear myself saying.

"What?"

"There's very little else I can think of that Heero would like more than to see you again."

"It's an easy thing for you to say," Duo replies, and I can hear his eyes flashing as he turns his head to look at me. "Easy for you to say when you have someone like Sally. She made herself sick worrying about you, but you didn't think about that, did you? She probably would've died if you had… And you've never given her anything to show for how much she cares about, have you? She loves you, Fei!"

It takes a long moment to regain my composure after such a weighty confession as that one. I had known that Sally would take it hard, but not to that extent. Duo's words strike true to my heart, and like a spear in my chest, and I have to clear my mind before I can manage to say the words I know must follow his angry shout.

"And Heero loves you."

***

My return to the office is not so much a triumphant one as it is a victorious one. After two weeks of forced recovery from Heero, I am back in good shape, and walk myself right back into the Preventers office. Lady Une's secretary said that it was fine for me to come back when I felt comfortable doing so, and now I feel comfortable, despite having to wear new boots that make my feet hurt a little as I walk in them. The office is much cleaner, if possible, than when I returned. The carpets were still being replaced when I left, and the window glass was still being shipped in. Something to do with the insurance companies not wanting to pay the contractors and the government having made no provision for retrofitting the building.

Julia waves a timid hello, mindful of my prior mood, and I offer her an easy smile. She can't know about Wufei and Trowa. She doesn't have the connections that I do, and so she won't have been informed that they are going to be returning. All she knows is that I care about them, and it's putting me on edge.

And in her own way, she cares and is trying to make me feel better. But she doesn't know how, because she hasn't known me for long enough.

I can't fault her for that.

Although it would be extremely amusing to see her trying to have a conversation with Heero, someone who does understand. All around me everyone appears to be catching up on paperwork, and so I head in to my office to find a list of assignments on my desk.

I laugh as I read it.

Apparently, on top of being in charge of his finances, I'm now expected to finish his old mission reports as well. There's a stack of folders on the desk. With a sigh, I set the to-do list to the side and start in on the papers.

I feel the presence more than hear her.

"Hello, Hilde," I say in a quiet voice without looking up.

She jumps a little. "How did you-" but she cuts herself off and chuckles. "Hi Sally. Finally catching up on his paperwork, I take it?"

She's sensed the change in my mood, undoubtedly, and is checking in on me. A nice woman. I almost feel sorry for her about Duo… but in a different way than I feel sorry for Heero. The way the two of them care about the same person is so intensely different that I don't quite know how it's the same person being cared for.

The phone rings.

"Just give me a second, Hilde, I'll be right with you," I say as I reach for the receiver.

The voice on the other end is familiar, and disconcerting. The noise of electronic delay is on the line, telling me it's a long distance call, from outer space. "I've just put the both of them on a shuttle on their way home. They should touch down in London tomorrow evening at six. I hope /someone/ there has the sense to pick them up."

"D-"

"Yeah, Sal, it's me. I thought I should tell you this part myself, because I… well Fei's still… a little injured. He's not the same as he was when he left you. It's my fault I shoulda-"

"What's wrong with him?"

I look up, and find that Hilde's retreated from the doorway, and has closed it behind her. Leave it to her to know when I'm going to need privacy. She seems to know when to quit, something I'm rather sad that Duo must have taught her.

"His eyes," Duo says cryptically. "I've got to go, Sally… I have… another phone call to make before I get off this space port."

"What do you mean? What's happened? Is he-" my voice sounds strained and worried, I cut myself off. That's no way to be asking about Wufei's condition, or what happened. And anyway, Duo doesn't respond any more to it. Whatever he had to say about Wufei, he's said. But he doesn't hang up yet. So I ask the only question left. "And Trowa?"

"He's fine… easier to break him out than Fei," Duo says, and then he hangs up the phone.

Silently, as I lean back in my chair, I hope the other phone call he's making is to Heero. It will do the silent bastard some good to get a little bit of a shock. And there's no bigger shock than Duo calling up. He said it'd been years since he'd seen the other pilot, and I suddenly wonder just how long that was.

After a long moment, I return to my paperwork. His paperwork.

I'll inform Lady Une after lunch that they'll be returning in the morning. I'm sure she'll be just as glad as I am to have them home.

And I think I'll call Quatre as well.

Trowa should have at least as good of a welcome back as Wufei's going to get.


	5. Touchdown

The London Space Terminal is crowded with people making their way in groups to and fro. I stand wishing it was like the one in Hong Kong, where I can see over most of the people, but am, at the same time, glad that it isn't. And besides, Trowa will stand out.

After talking to Lady Une, once she recovered from the biggest amount of shock I've ever seen on her face, she agreed to let me pick the two of them up alone, in order not to cause a scene, with the understanding that Quatre would be coming with me, and since I'm 'officially' off-duty and in plain clothes, I can do what I want with who I want. Quatre even dressed down for the occasion, the Winner Corporation CEO wearing a pair of baggy jeans and a broken in tee-shirt with a baseball cap to hide his bright blond hair.

I was very nervous when picking out the outfit that I was going to wear this morning, despite knowing that Wufei likely couldn't see it. If I hadn't known I probably would've cared less. But knowing… somehow it made looking proper more important.

Backwards logic, but my own.

If he could see what I had on, I could've worn a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt, because he would've been able to chide me for being so informal. But without him being able to see it, I felt the pressure of everyone's eyes but the ones that mattered. I only do things like that to make him react, if I'm being honest with myself.

And if he can't react to them… there's no reason anyone else should get to.

So I'm standing next to Quatre, nearly a head taller than him, wearing a pair of pressed slacks and boots fit for the ice and snow outside the terminal, and a button down blouse under a long, thick wool coat. Wufei's long coat is over my arm as I glance around anxiously, and needlessly.

Trowa rarely has a problem seeing over anyone, and he spots us before I can think to see him over everyone. "Sally," he says in the same quiet voice that made me trust him the first moment I met him.

I turn and find Quatre's launched himself forward, nearly knocking the startled, taller young man over in his enthusiasm. I watch with a reserved expression as he latches slender arms around Trowa's strong neck and buries his face against the tan skinned man's shoulder. And then I see Wufei, and all rational thought goes out of my head.

My knees are weak as I step over to him, extending a hand blindly for his cheek, "Fei?" I start, but my voice catches in my throat.

He looks a little thin, and his eyes are a little dull as he looks in my direction, but the warm cheek under my hand is his, and the calloused palm that lifts to catch my hand against his face certainly belongs to the man that left me months ago.

In the background, I hear Trowa's startled attempts at conversing with Quatre, but they seem to melt into the background as I hear him speak my name with a little hesitancy, "Sai Lei?"

"Yes. Fei. I'm here."

His fingers tighten around my hand, and I see the faint pleased smile that spreads across his lips, lighting up his handsome face. "Then I am home."

And that's it. There's no triumphant embrace, no bone crushing hug in the middle of the concourse. Next to Quatre's welcome, mine probably seems much colder, but at the same time, our reunion is different. "I brought your jacket," I say, dumbly, and offer it to him.

"It served you well then?" he asks, and I glance up from where my eyes had lowered to stare at it and find a smile on his lips as he pulls it on. "I hoped it would find you better than I was when I left it with Trowa."

Eventually, I'm going to want a real explanation about what really happened to him, but at the moment, as Trowa is attempting to get Quatre's hat back on so that no one recognizes him, and Wufei takes my hand in his, I really don't care.

*** 

After I allowed Trowa to get whisked away by Quatre without commenting, I was bundled into the passenger's seat of her car. Sai Lei told me in a soft, quick voice that she had brought him so that Trowa would have a sense of the welcome she didn't think she could properly give him. There is silence in the car around us, and it is pregnant with things we haven't said to one another, and things we are afraid to say.

Finally, she breaks it, and her tone implies that she is aware it had to be her to make the first breach in the silence, whether or not I knew it until she spoke. "I never knew you named me as your next of kin."

"There was no one else," I say simply. The truth, as I see it.

"Trowa," she offers softly, "Heero."

"I was never what I would consider family to them," I say, and know that it is also true. "Nothing between the three of us could truly be considered more than a loose camaraderie, before… I have not spent enough time with them to know them well enough to call them my family, and when those forms were completed, there was no one but you."

There is silence in the car for a moment, and I feel the stoplight approaching more than see it. The car slows and I feel a calmer atmosphere extending in the space between us. I lean my head back on the headrest and she turns on the radio, speaking in a quiet voice, "I didn't know I was that important to you, then."

"There was no decision made," I say, and wince at the harshness of my own words. Duo may have been right. Whatever love or care she has for me is based not on my actions, but on something else entirely. I have given her precious little to go by.

The radio turns up.

"Where are we going?" I ask, speaking up a little to interrupt the song.

"I haven't had the heart to go into your apartment and see how you left it," she says, and I know she's chewing on her bottom lip by the way her words are garbled just slightly, "So I'm taking you home."

"To your apartment?" I ask, curious. It seems years ago when I was last in her apartment, rather than the few months it has been in reality.

There is a long pause, and then she catches herself from whatever facial expression she was making in answer and says, "Yes, to my apartment." She must have been nodding.

We both start speaking at the same time.

"You'll have to walk me around… I can see shapes, but not clearly enough to discern what unfamiliar things are."

"It's only temporary, until I can make sure that your place is-" she stops short, a curse word on her lips, and I smile involuntarily.

"What?"

"Blockade on the street up ahead… we'll have to detour." She sighs. It's a frequent enough occurrence that we're used to it, living in London, where car accidents and small acts of terrorism or riots are all causes for bad traffic and long delays. Just because we have reached such a height of technology does not mean that we have made the world perfect, and it does not mean that we have mastered the parts of our humanity that are most antagonistic or destructive.

"Where are we?"

"Thirteenth and Kinnel."

"Then go to my apartment. You have the keys with you, I trust?"

"Yes, Fei, but-"

"I promise you that the apartment will be only dusty if not otherwise immaculate. I am not one to leave a mess before a mission," I assure her, and hear her sigh. "And there is little harmful that I may do to you, Sai Lei."

She stutters a moment, and I hear the soft clicking of the turn signal. "If you say so," she mutters.


	6. Sound Sleep

I don't know what I expected when we entered his apartment, but the bills all being paid, he went about turning on the lights, all without my help. I supposed that he would need me to help him around, but again I find myself in the living room, glancing over the vaguely familiar photographs, only to find one missing.

He returns, finally, and steps close to me, as though reassuring himself that I am still there. "You took down her picture," I say softly to him, turning to glance at the wall where it used to hang.

In response, he steps up behind me and reaches out to place gentle hands on my shoulders. I can almost feel the weariness in him, radiating like a beacon. "She deserves her rest," he says.

"So do you," I respond automatically, turning slightly to face him. His eyes search mine, and though they are slightly unfocused, there is nothing else different about them. "Which way is it to the bedroom?"

"There is only one bed," he says in his own way of protesting, though when I slip my arms around his waist he sags slightly against me, curling his neck to wrest his cheek on the crown of my head. "And you are dressed like you have a business meeting…"

"In a way, it was," I say absently.

"I will sleep on the couch," he says.

"You will do nothing of the sort, Chang Wu Fei," I snap stubbornly. "Which way is it to the bedroom, before you pass out in exhaustion and I have to drag you down the hallway?"

He slips his arms around my waist, and leans his head against mine, closing his eyes to inhale deeply the scent of my hair. Self-consciously I feel like I should have washed it better. "Second door on the left," he says in a deep, steady voice. I can feel it rumbling in his chest.

After another moment of standing in his arms, I tug on his waist and he sighs, "You're really serious about this… aren't you?"

"I've had a long, hard day, Fei," I say quietly.

"I think I've had a longer one," he replies, allowing me to draw away and lead him down the hallway by the hand. "And while Duo's heart is in the right place, he's not the best at nursing people back to health."

"I didn't want to say anything about that," I admit, pushing open his door, "but you're thinner than usual." The bedroom is, indeed, a little dusty, as he said it might be, but it's also beautiful, in its own way. The red, lacquered wood of the furniture is accented by the dark fabrics and contrast with the few plants and the pale gray walls.

There is a wardrobe in one corner, with a standing mirror next to it, and across from that is a chest of drawers. In the center of the far wall is the four poster bed, and the throw on it has beautiful green embroidery. "You're awfully quiet," he says, reaching over to turn on the light. "Is it displeasing?"

"No," I mumble, finding my voice has left me. "Quite the contrary. It's beautiful."

"I had it shipped from Sichuan," he says, letting go of my hand to cross unerringly to the dresser. He opens it and tosses me a folded article of clothing.

"What's this?"

"An oversized tee-shirt that Duo sent me once, claiming I might appreciate the insignia on it. I never have figured out why," he pauses, and I see his expression. He understands Duo's joke, I'm sure of it. "You don't have anything else to sleep in, so I thought you might appreciate the loan of it."

"Thanks," I murmur, watching him closely as he opens another drawer, the well-worn wood moving silently against its fittings. He withdraws a pair of white pajamas and motions me towards a door on the far side of the bed.

"The bathroom's in there. You change and I'll head into the other one."

"You don't have to-" I start to protest, but he disappears around the doorway and into the hall. I can hear the faint fall of his footsteps as he moves around, probably turning off the lights and securing the door. I finally unfold the tee-shirt and don't bother to stifle my chuckle.

There's a giant panda in a karate gi on it.

I can remember Duo's voice and the threatened reaction on Wufei's part.

And that ridiculous nickname that he used to crow up and down the halls of the Peacemillion.

'Wu-bear.'

With a smile, I step into the bathroom to change.

*** 

The bed had never seemed empty, looking back on it, until she climbed into it with me. I had been managing to believe wholeheartedly that the queen sized mattress was meant for one person.

But then, Sai Lei tends to cause me to reevaluate a lot of things in my life, and this is just another one of them. When I wake, I find myself laying on my side with one arm around her waist. She is tucked against my chest, her head pillowed on her folded hands, and there is a peaceful expression on her resting face. Or at least, what I can make out of it.

Her long, sandy hair is loose, and, waking, I find the urge to stroke it too compelling, and brush it gently over her face to fall down her back. At the touch, I feel her awareness change. She's woken up.

"Morning," she mumbles in a sleepy voice, shifting a little closer to me. "Did you sleep well?" She keeps her face angled down, as though afraid her morning breath will repulse me, and I allow her that, as she allows me the smile that tinges the edges of my mouth.

"My eyes are continually tired, but other than that, I haven't slept better since before I can remember," I say, truthfully, letting my hand tighten on the small of her back, gathering the fabric of the ridiculous tee-shirt against her body. "And you?"

"Like a kitten," she says, breath quickening slightly at the feel of my hand on her back. "I should probably get going," she adds. "I don't have a toothbrush and I'm going to need to shower before work."

"It's a Saturday," I hear my voice say, slightly cold, and wince.

"And I have to do all of your filing as well as my own." She reaches up to brush her fingers against my cheek, tucking my hair behind my ear, and sits up, the long fall of her hair covering her face as she looks down at me, my arm still looped around her waist.

The last time I kissed her, there was an ill motive behind it. I wanted her to let go, and to act and not withdraw into a shell, but this time, as I reach up to tip her face down towards mine, it is simply because I want her to know…

And I want to.

It is gentle, and sweet. Somehow despite our attire, and the bashful flush to her cheeks, there's very little suggestive about it. We both pull away after a moment, and my slightly hard to focus eyes blink as I try to see her clearly.

She starts to speak, but instead lifts a hand to her lips, and then she gently pulls away and heads towards the bathroom. "I'm going to have to race back to my apartment to change and make it in time."

"I am certain that Lady Une will forgive your tardiness," I say, leaning back against the bed and closing my eyes. Whatever she took from it is either not enough to make her stay, or too much for her not leave at the moment. Either way it is my fault for forcing her hand, she won't be remaining with me.

"I'll bring groceries by tonight," she says, voice muffled through the door and her clothing as she dresses. "I'd do it during lunch, but I'm not likely to make it there and back again with traffic and this ice."

"You plan to return here?" I ask, sitting up again. For a short moment I thought that she might have been contemplating leaving me to my own devices, but apparently Duo was right to say that she loves me.

And if it is not love as he might consider it… the burning, hurtful passion he shared with Heero, then it is love as I have always named it, deeply caring and devoted. Many sides to the same face, and as binding as anything that was ever between those two tumultuous lovers. The love they share, and I think it in the present tense because they still do care for one another, is as enduring as this, it is merely different. It changed Heero, and hurt Duo. Whichever caused the other I am not now nor have I ever truly been sure. She continues, breaking my train of thought.

"With some of my clothes so I don't have to borrow something to sleep in tonight… and so I don't have to rush out on Monday morning so quick to get home."

"What about Sunday?"

"I thought we could get you to a doctor tomorrow, and see what they have to say about your eyes…" she comes back into the room and hesitates at the bedside before leaning over to stroke my cheek. "Try to stay out of trouble at least until I get back tonight?"

Catching her hand and stroking her knuckles with my fingers, I nod. "As you wish."


	7. Formal Tenderness

It was so hard to tear myself away from him this morning and hurry to my apartment to change into this blasted uniform. Especially when he was being so demonstrative with his affection. Still very formal, and yet very welcoming at the same time. It distracts me all the way through my mad dash out the door, and the drive down to headquarters.

Obviously, since I missed yesterday afternoon, people have started asking questions. I pass Trowa in the hallway, and he offers me a faint, unsure smile. The other people at the office may think what they like. Leave it to Trowa to think the best, and also the worst, of a situation. "Paperwork," I murmur, leaving him to his imagination and heading for my office. He should know Wufei well enough to know what didn't happen last night between us, and if he doesn't… I really don't care.

They're both safe, and the relief of that makes all of this worth it.

"What are you doing in today?" a voice calls, startled, from the end of the hall as I fumble with the keys looking for the one to open my office. I turn for a moment as I jam the key into the lock on the door, and find that Lady Une is staring at me, incredulous.

"Did you say the same thing to Trowa?" I ask her, setting my briefcase just inside the door. "I just saw him in the hall."

"On his way home," she corrects. "They've both earned some time off."

And I know she means Wufei as the other part of that they. Suddenly it makes me a little angry. As though the two of them deserve this sort of a job after what they went through. But there's a part of me that corrects me mentally, as the stupid words leave my mouth. They both chose to keep doing this job.

"Wufei wouldn't accept that," I say quietly, "you know he wouldn't…"

"But he doesn't have a choice," Lady Une responds in an equally grave voice. She inspects me with bright, intelligent eyes. "Trowa did debrief this morning," there is a pause in her sentence, "it appears Wufei's eyes were damaged."

"Yes, it does. I told him to rest."

"I've made a few calls, there are doctors I'd like him to see."

"So that he can get back to work?" I hear the anger in my voice, and know instantly that it's unfounded, Lady Une isn't that much of a heartless slave driver, but after this morning, I need someone to be angry at. I think she understands, because she shakes her head and turns to head off.

"No, Sally, so that he can get back to living." The words cause me pause, but she doesn't give me an opportunity to respond before she says, "Don't stay after lunch. He needs you more than we need the filing finished." I start to object, but she interrupts, "And if you're so worried about paperwork, I'll have Hilde see to it."

I blush, embarrassed and not a little ashamed of my reaction to her gentle care. I step into my office and close the door behind me, leaning against it for a long moment before heading over to my desk and booting up the old computer. I sit down in my desk chair and take a deep breath. All the filing still has to be entered in the hard way, even though we fill out the reports twice.

According to 'experts' that makes it more confidential and harder to break in to. I'm not certain if I believe that, thinking about how the Alliance and Oz both used the same techniques, and Heero still managed to hack into them, but it's not my place to make judgment calls on the computer systems.

In the meantime, it means a lot of extra work for all of us.

I lean back in my chair and stare up at the ceiling in mute fascination at the patterns that my lazy mind makes out of the markings in the insulated dropped ceiling. The panels are prefabricated, of course, and there's no marking that's meant to make a design other than none at all, but nonetheless my eyes seem to trace out a pattern, as though I am making my own constellations of the markings up there.

And I see his face smiling down on me.

There's a cough from the doorway.

I'm obviously not going to get any work done today. I turn my eyes to the door and find Hilde has come timidly to my door, and is smiling shyly. "Sally?"

"Yea, Hilde?"

I remember her mettle, suddenly, and the way she stood up for me on the temp floor. She only holds up the faux effect of shyness because it suits her, I bet. The same way that Duo used to wear his cheerful mask. She steps in and closes the door.

"I spoke to Trowa," she says simply, as though that should explain everything.

It doesn't.

"And?"

"I know that it was… Duo… that saved them." Her voice catches on the mention of his name, and I swallow. I know where she's coming from, what she's feeling. And I hate the thought of someone else feeling that way. I wonder, suddenly, if she wonders, as much as I did this past couple months, about Duo the way I wondered about Fei.

"So Wufei told me as well," I say, not committing to an answer. It hurts me to see her so helpless against the very mention of someone seeing Duo, but there isn't anything that I can do about it. And I very much don't think Duo wanted her to know where he was. I make a silent apology to him, even though it's Trowa that informed her.

"He was the one who called you, wasn't he?" her voice is a little sharp, almost accusing.

I lower my head in the closest thing to a nod that I can without betraying him wholly to her. It isn't that I don't like and respect Hilde…

Quite the contrary.

I just can't get the image of Heero out of my mind, from when he mentioned Duo to me, what seems like years ago now, on L1 when we were resting after concluding our business. It was horribly tender and quite open.

Something I cannot begrudge him towards Duo, because he did not begrudge me the same towards Wufei. If I have a chance to help Duo find his way back to Heero, I won't hurt it. And Hilde might hurt that, make Duo retreat into hiding again. Whatever else is between Duo and Heero, there's love there. And that's not worth forsaking so easily.

"Did he… leave any word for me?" her words break my silent reverie.

I try not to look at her, but my eyes settle on hers inevitably. There is nothing else to look at in the room with her standing there by the door. I instantly regret it. It's written in her eyes. She would drop everything and go look for him, as I know she did before. And so it hurts me to say it, but I say, "No, Hilde, he didn't."

She swallows the lump in her throat. It is true. He did not say not to tell her he'd called, but he didn't, either, ask me to tell her that he was doing well. I can do no better or worse than what I have. But the sympathetic part of my heart hurts at being so cold to her about the topic, when she, I can see from looking at her, would do much differently if our circumstances were reversed.

"I see," she says, softly. Her voice sounds defeated, and I know there is nothing in my face to offer comfort. She turns to go when I stop her with her name.

"Hilde." She does not turn back towards me. "Duo does care about you. He did what he thought was kindness, in the circumstances."

"Perhaps," she says, opening the door. "But he doesn't love me."

And she steps through it, closing it softly. I sigh.

For every hopeful heart satisfied, another is broken.

I push my chair back from the desk and give up on the paperwork. Lady Une was right, I'm not going to get much done today, whatever my good intentions were.

I run into Trowa in the hallway as I slip my jacket on over my shoulders, and there is an awkward moment of silence before he speaks, "You didn't have to bring him to the terminal with you."

"I couldn't have brought Jean," I respond, suddenly unable to meet his eyes. After what Jean proposed to me, I can hardly handle looking him in the eye, let alone taking him somewhere with me. And the dejected, defeated part of Quatre that I had to see was too much for me to see without acting on it in some way. "Not after knowing how much-"

"I care about Jean," he says, and I'm not quite sure whether he's saying it to make a point to himself or to try and make me believe it. The look in the eye of his I can see is unsure, smoky almost, as though there are things he's not ready to speak, things he can't say to me. "Quatre has his own priorities."

"And you're one of them," I hear myself say in a stubborn voice. He can't be this cold about it. Quatre really cares for him… the same way that Heero cares for Duo, the way that I… "Trowa…"

"Regardless of that," he says, interrupting me. I blink and wait for him to go on. "Be easy on Wufei, will you? He's not quite sure how to handle how he feels about you."

I start to ask a question, but Quatre steps into the hallway, and I find that I can't entrust whatever I wanted to know to his ears, not anymore. If Trowa doesn't want to fall back into Quatre's arms, that's his choice. I won't violate it.

"I'm going to go to him now," I say, and glance between the two of them. "Should I-?"

"Tell him that I send my best," Trowa says, green eyes trained on Quatre. "And that Quatre does as well."

"I need to talk to you, Trowa," Quatre says. Trowa nods and I head towards the elevator to give them their privacy, catching out of the corner of my ear Trowa's response of, "My office is this way."


	8. Delayed Understanding

I hear the lock turn in the door from where I'm folded on the floor and turn my head towards it. Not the landlord, not with the way the door was opened, slowly, as though afraid to disturb me inside. The landlord doesn't really care if he disturbs me, knowing me as well as he does, but it's early for her to be back yet.

"Fei?"

But it is, nonetheless, her.

"In the back," I respond, not quite rising. "You're early."

I hear her footsteps in the hall, tentative and slow. So much between us is just like her footsteps. "I couldn't spend the whole day at work. Lady Une sent me home early. I just couldn't concentrate." She's at the doorway now, and I feel her hesitate before stepping in.

"I am dressed decently enough, aren't I?" I ask in a gentle voice. I stripped down out of the clothes I had been wearing yesterday in order to stretch properly, something that is very hard to do on a ship. I sat down to meditate earlier, when I got a phone call from Heero, asking if I would look after his apartment for a little while.

It seems the mention I made to Duo about the stoic former pilot still loving him had some impact after all. He wouldn't commit to a day when he was willing to say he'd return. But he did mention that if he didn't, I was allowed to empty it properly, and he would get me word of that.

"Of course." My eyes are closed, but I can tell there's likely a faint blush on her cheeks. "I just wasn't sure if you'd be resting or not."

"Resting? I'm not injured in a manner that requires resting, Sai Lei."

"I didn't mean it like that, Fei, I-"

"Why couldn't you spend the whole day at work?" I ask, leaning back slightly.

"It just felt wrong," she says, and I feel her reluctance to talk about it in her voice.

"Where are your things?" I ask, changing the subject. I open my eyes to take in the blurry sight of her. She is standing, still in her uniform, and isn't carrying anything.

"I left them in the living room. The groceries need to get put away and I want to set up a laptop so we can email the office about paperwork. There's way too much of it left there for us when we go back."

"Did Une give you a vacation?"

"Not exactly."

She disappears to put away the groceries she mentioned, but continues the conversation as she does. "Everyone sends their best, including Trowa. Trowa feels guilty that you were hurt, though."

I follow her, slowly, and watch her move about the kitchen. She moves quickly, as though moving will keep her thoughts at bay. I remember such actions in myself, at one point.

"It is not his fault," I say, taking a seat on one of the stools. "He has nothing to feel guilty about."

"Well, you know he doesn't see it that way. Just like you wouldn't, if he had been hurt." The bag is empty, and she moves to the sink to do more, but I stop her by putting my hands on her shoulders.

"It's ok."

She stiffens. "What is?"

"Come with me," I say. The kitchen is not the place to have this discussion. She needs to know that there's nothing wrong with what's happening, with what happened to me. That I am ok. That she is ok.

She lets me lead her back to the bedroom.

"Sit down."

"Where?"

"On the bed, of course," I motion to it, standing in the doorway. "If you're scared of what I'm going to do, I'll stay over here. I won't do anything."

"What if I want you to do something," she mutters as she crosses, and I have to pause and look at her again. Her face, still blurry, is now blushing visibly.

"What?" my voice is sharp in the air, and I swallow.

It has been a long time since I've had to think about someone like that. A long time since I've bothered to think about that sort of an exertion of my body. After Meiran…

Meiran and I never did much more than fight one another, but once… once the two of us managed to get into a fight that lead the two of us straight down onto the practice mats. If anyone had come into the dojo that day, we would have both been whipped. We were betrothed, but not married, exactly. The entire clan knew that we would be a good match, if we could ever stop fighting. They never knew, when she died, that she wasn't as pure as she had been.

I was never sure if the tears in her eyes when she left were because she knew she was going to die and she would miss me, or if it was something else. She was more moody the last few months, and the only thing I've ever had to compare it to is a pregnant woman.

But I can't handle thinking about that possibility. If Meiran died with child…

"Fei?"

Sally's voice interrupts my thoughts, and I feel that she's close to me, kneeling just over my shoulder. "You're thinking awfully hard about something." Her voice is as hesitant as her footsteps in the hallway were, and she slowly leans over my shoulder, putting her arms around my middle. "I'm sorry," she whispers, and her voice tickles my ear.

"There is nothing for you to be sorry about," I respond, turning to glance at her.

"What were you thinking about?"

I swallow, unwilling to say it and hurt her. So I do the next best thing that I can think of, and I tilt my chin slightly, pressing my lips to the corner of hers. Her fingers tighten around my stomach slightly, and then her body relaxes against my back. Twisting slightly, I draw her down across my lap.

"You're evading the question," she says in a gentle voice as I lean down and press my lips against hers again.

"Perhaps," I respond. "If I am?"

She lifts a hand and slips the band out of my hair, threading her fingers through it. "I think I can be convinced to overlook it… for the time being."


	9. Inevitable Confrontation

I watched Sally before she left, and saw the distracted look in her eyes. She had more to say. But it'll keep, I know. I hope that she makes it to Wufei's apartment without getting into an accident. What Duo said to him was very true, I realize, in a way that I didn't before. She loves him.

I glance out the window in my office and find that the skyline is bright enough to warrant the blinds being closed a little, and so I do, stepping over. With my back to the door, I barely hear the footsteps of the person who steps inside and don't notice them until the door closes behind whoever followed me in.

"Trowa."

"Jean, now isn't the time."

"I was worried, you know," he offers, and as I turn to look at him, I see it's true, in moderation. Whatever else, Jean has always been honest with me. But that's not what drew me to him. The eyes reminded me…

He starts to see the original is standing there, still the short, pale angel that he's always been. There's a cold glance between the two of them, and I speak as much to divert their energy as to respond to his comment.

"I know you were, Jean."

Nevertheless, there's a moment where the two of them glare at one another. I can see Jean sizing Quatre up, and the businessman looks not a bit less vicious as he surveys Jean. "I take it the two of you have met, then," I say, stepping over to the small closet and retrieving my jacket before scooping up my laptop case. "If not," I add when neither replies, "let me be the first to put this on the table. Quatre, this is Jean, my less than faithful paramour, Jean, this is Quatre, the… a very old friend."

I see the hurt in Quatre's eyes, but at the moment, I'm simply too bone tired to explain properly to Jean what he is to me, what he has been to me.

"The Winner CEO that has you hopping like a puppet on a string, you mean?" His words are harsh. I think it's a bit of his ego that's striking back for the blow I dealt his vanity. "The one that broke your heart years ago?"

The noise of a slap breaks up the conversation, and I glance at Quatre with an inquiringly raised eyebrow, and he shakes his head, wiping a tear from his eye. The ring on his finger glints in the sunlight, and the ache in my chest I managed to ignore for a while with him returns at double the force.

One hand holding his slapped cheek, Jean starts to retort, but I lift a finger to his lips and take him by the wrist. "Go back to your office, Jean, and I'll see you tonight. Mr. Winner and I have some unfinished conversation that needs to happen."

He looks hurt as well, and offended, but as I guide him out the door he doesn't protest vocally, and when it closes behind him, Quatre finally lets the rest of the tears fall down his cheeks. He takes himself the three steps over to the desk and picks up a tissue.

"Is that all?" he asks, once he finds his voice. "Is that all I am to you?"

"Quatre, you wanted a family," I say in a soft voice. "You wanted a family and you _needed_ an heir. We both know I couldn't give you that. Not in a way you could accept."

"Trowa I still-"

"I'm tired, Quatre," I reply, shoulders slumping slightly, "I'm tired and I want to be able to rest for once." I don't want him to say what I know he's going to. I can't handle that, after everything else. I was ready to die on that mission. I was ready to give up my life so that Wufei and Sally would be happy together, because I know that they will be. I meant what I said when I said that he would make it back to her.

I intended it to be my last act.

I was mistaken.

Duo changed all that.

"Trowa, please, listen, I-"

"What do you want to hear me say, Quatre?" I ask, voice colder than I mean it to be. "That I love you? That I always have? That hasn't changed. I still love you. I won't lie to you. Not now. I won't start that. But I won't take the happy family from the child your wife is pregnant with. And I won't make you unfaithful to her. Because we both know you won't leave her for me… no matter what you feel for me."

Quatre, after all, made his choice long ago.

I step over to the door and open it. He puts a hand on my arm, and my skin, even through my uniform and jacket, tingles. He does that to me. He makes my flesh tingle and my body ache. "I love you, Trowa," he replies, "and I'm glad that you're safe."

"I'm tired, Quatre," I repeat, and I know how weak a defense against his words that is. "And I'm sure your wife misses you."


	10. A Night of Revelations

It's late, and I stir, mostly because my stomach is relatively empty.

His hands tighten around my back, pulling me against him. I don't remember falling asleep, or sitting on the bed, but I don't feel alienated by being in his arms or between his sheets. I'm just surprised that I'm still fully dressed.

"Nothing to worry about," he replies, and his chin nuzzles the top of my head.

"Sure," I reply, "but I'm hungry." I roll out of bed, pulling away from his embrace. I shiver slightly as I head out into the rest of his apartment, and it's not because it's cold in here.

In his own quiet manner, I guess Wufei was trying to be kind by not sleeping with me. I was weary of everything, and I suppose he was a little scared of the idea of it. Not that I blame him. There is something safe about the relationship as it is. He is warm and secure and alive, and that's enough for me. It should be.

I went to China to get away from a city that was empty of him, and I only came back when I found out that there was nothing in China to replace him. But now that I'm here and he's here and he's safe, I don't, almost, know how to handle it. Trowa was right to say that Wufei would want to take it slow, and I thank him for the warning in the back of my mind. Hell. I need to take it slow right now, despite what my body tells me when he touches me.

I reach the kitchen and open the refrigerator, hoping the bright light will wipe my mind clean of the memory of his lips. Milk, orange juice, eggs…

"Are you hungry?" I call out. "I'll cook something."

He doesn't respond, and I take a deep breath, letting it out slowly. If this is how he wants things… "Can you even cook?" his voice is sarcastic, and coming from the doorway and I am startled to find him standing there behind me. I thought he would still be in the bedroom.

"Of course I can cook."

"You eat out a lot," he says, stepping in to cross and stand over next to the sink. "You left bed suddenly," he says, reaching up and finding the door of the cabinet and opening it to retrieve a glass.

"I told you, I was hungry."

"That isn't why you got up." His back is to me, and I can feel the sharp tone in his voice, even though he doesn't intend it to be so.

"Then why did I?" I reply, turning and folding my arms, back to the closed door of the refrigerator. It's cool in the tee-shirt I've got on. The one he put me in, no doubt. It reminds me of things I find I shouldn't forget. "Hmm?"

He sets the glass down on the counter. "I don't want to fight you," his voice is very tired. "I-"

The phone rings, cutting him off. It is very loud in the empty quiet of the apartment. I usually keep music running in my apartment, softly in the background, because I've found that I often cannot stand complete silence. He obviously doesn't share that problem.

"Are you going to answer it?" we ask at the same time. With a sigh, he reaches over and picks it up. He speaks in a soft voice for several minutes before hanging up.

"Who was it?"

"Quatre," Wufei says, replacing the receiver gently on the cradle. He lowers his face so that his chin is brushing against his neck. "It's Trowa… he was in a car accident."

My heart catches in my throat. I just saw Trowa a few hours ago. He was…

"He's not dead, is he?"

Wufei coughs, shaking his head. "No, Trowa isn't dead. I would've gotten much more than a phone call if that were the case. But Quatre is at the hospital waiting on the results of his emergency operation, and he's at a loss for what to do."

"Do you want to go down there?"

He nods, slowly, and reaches a hand out in my direction, taking a step towards me. "Sally, I…"

"Please, don't," I respond, cutting his words short. "I don't want to force you into anything you aren't ready for." I hear the resignation in my own voice, and he takes a step forward, lifting his hand to my cheek in response. I don't know how he knows where that is, but he does.

"There comes a time when it's beyond being ready for something, and just accepting it." He draws me close to him and I feel a bit of the anxiety melt from my shoulders. Maybe he wasn't just being nice… maybe what he was waiting for was the proper moment. "Sai Lei, I love you."


	11. Wrong Words

Lying here, curled up next to her is bliss. I never thought I would find so much peace with any woman, and yet, at the same time, she seems to center me, to bring me a whole new relaxation that I never knew before her.

It was a nightmare that awoke me from slumber. I thought it might have woken her as well, the way that television shows and movies say things should happen. People in love are supposed to have some sort of bond in that regard.

Either we are not in love, or the media lies.

I am more tempted to believe that it is the media that lies.

So I am lying next to her, behind her, staring at the underside of the canopy over the bed. It seems old to me, but I am aware that it is only the tricks of my wounded eyes. I glance at her.

There is something entirely fascinating about the way that she breathes when she is falling asleep, or when she is dreaming. The rise and fall of her chest. The slight flare of her nostrils.

Fascinating, and precious.

Trowa's in the hospital. He hasn't woken up yet. The doctor's say that the outlook is good that he will, sometime soon, but I'm worn out of caring for other people. Not that I care for many people, but I do care about the others. About Duo and Heero and Trowa and Quatre. I just can't care about them right now. I'm too weary of it. We cared for the world, protected it, and then, as Duo found so easily, we were turned out by the world we shared.

I don't think that Quatre's taking this all too well. I told him to come and stay in my apartment until he felt he could return home, but he declined with some mumble or another about the scandal it would cause. And besides, he told me, I deserved to spend time in my apartment with Sai Lei.

One day I will have to come clean to her about all the things I hide from her, and from everyone. I know that. One day I will have to wash the blood off of my hands if I am going to touch her, as she wants me to, and as I wish to. But that day hasn't come.

Not when she's so worn out herself. Of everyone, she's spent the most time fretting over Trowa's accident. As though she feels to blame for the whole thing. We've all tried to tell her that it is not her fault, but she continues to go to the hospital and sit by his bed. Ever since the day she first drove me there, that day when I told her…

But she hasn't avoided me to go see Trowa. She's been right beside me, every evening, asleep as she is now, with her face nested against my chest. Plutonic intimacy, I believe, is the term that best describes the two of us over the past two weeks.

And tomorrow we're both 'officially' off-duty, and I'm scheduled to see the next of three specialists that Lady Une contacted about the damage done to my eyes.

She shifts.

"Fei?" her voice is groggy.

"Yes?" I ask, glancing at her in the moonlight as best I can. My vision has started to come back, some, and I can see most things, though everything is blurred. I'm not quite sure if it means that I need glasses or that there's permanent, irreparable damage.

"You're wide awake." She leans forward to kiss my neck and her hands tighten around me. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Wufei."

She rarely uses my full name unless she's certain I'm hiding something from her. She does not know how much of the time I hide things from everyone. Not for certain. She cannot. And I love her for that. I love her because she can love someone with so much hidden.

"Yes?" I ask, knowing my voice, so late in the darkness, betrays me.

"What is it?" When I do not answer, she continues. "What's wrong? Fei… talk to me… please?" She shifts her body, coming up on one elbow to look down at me where I lie, face turned up towards the ceiling that I cannot see through the canopy atop the bed. Her voice is beseeching. The green throw is over the two of us, proof against the economic chill in the air of the room. Her free hand lifts to brush the hair from my face, and I know she feels the trickle of sweat on my brow.

"Nothing," I reply again, and I can feel the moment that the word is out of my mouth that it is the wrong one to have said. She throws the blankets from her and struggles her way out of the bed, fighting her way free of our tangled limbs and over to the closet. "Sai Lei? Where are you going, it is two o'clock in the morning."

"I can read the clock too, ya know?" she snaps.

I sigh, closing my eyes and leaning my head back against the pillows.

I have been waiting for this moment, and fearing it. There is only ever so much of me that anyone can stand. Sai Lei. The other pilots. Even Meiran.

"Be ready by eight," she adds, irritably wrapping herself first in her robe and then in her jacket, bundling the scarf around her neck. She then bends over and trips her way right into her boots, from the noises I can hear of her in the hallway.

The door closes firmly behind her.

I reach over and straighten the bed linens, trapping what remains of the warmth she brought to it inside with me as I settle down, farther on the mattress, and inhale the scent of her clinging to me deeply. It was bound to happen.

But that does not mean that I do not hate that it has happened as much as is possible.


	12. Unfamiliar Eyes, Familiar Hurt

I lean my head against the wall in the hallway, and thump it into the cool plaster until I can feel an ache developing in my skull. Just enough to remind me that I can still feel without him. I take a few deep breaths in the chill of the hallway, remind myself that it's warm in that bed, but cold there as well. At least as cold as it is out here, and gather what's left of my frazzled rejection before heading over to the elevator.

I press the button for the lobby, thankful that the attendant is off duty at this forsaken hour of night, hoping to be alone in my thoughts. But apparently, I have no such luck. "Garage level, Miss Po?" the friendly, aged attendant asks me.

"Yes," I respond, not quite meeting his eyes. I do not know what he must think of me… and that matters, for some reason.

"He is a hard man, Chang xian sheng," the man says, and his use of Chinese almost startles me. His voice is also respectful. "It must have upset him greatly for you to have left at such an hour. It is not safe to be out."

"In this city, it rarely is," I remark, pulling my collar up.

The elevator stops on the garage level. "Please, take care of yourself, Miss Po. For your sake, and for his."

I step out into the garage, and feel the chill seeping through the sheer pants of my pajamas, up my coat. I almost turn back to the elevator, but even as I turn my head I know that doors are closed. I square my shoulders and head to my car.

And that's when I feel the cold muzzle of the gun against my neck.

"Out for a little drive? It's pretty late at night for a lady to be out driving herself around, don't you think?"

The safety clicks off. Loud in my ears.

"Open the door."

I do, jerking it open far enough to hit my assailant with it. I duck my head. The gun goes off. I dive past the car, but not quite fast enough in my half-laced up boots, and stumble on a patch of oil and road salt, falling to the cold pavement in, scraping my hands and catching myself just before my cheek hits the cement.

"That was stupid, lady."

I hear the gun again, and close my eyes. "But I respect you for at least putting up a fight. I was just going to boost your car, but now I think I'd like to get to know you a little better."

Glancing up at my attacker, I frown. That's the last thing on my mind. He's wearing a ski mask and his features are obscured, but I can see past the holes in the ski mask and straight into his eyes. They're brown.

It hurts.

Almost of its own accord, my left leg sweeps his ankles out from under him, sending him toppling backwards. The gun clatters from his fingers. He didn't bother to load another bullet into the chamber, or it might have gone off again. I scramble to my feet, not nearly as agile as the martial artists in movies I've seen, or as… him… and bend to lift the gun from the pavement, reloading the chamber and pointing it at him.

"I really am not in the mood to be kidnapped, you see." I aim it at his head. "Take the mask off."

"You don't want me to do that."

I retrieve my cell phone from the pocket of my jacket and hit the number for the police. "Really? I think I do."

He slips the mask off, and glares at me.

His face is unfamiliar to me, but the spark in his brown eyes is very familiar.

"The police are on their way," I say, memorizing his features in case he manages to overpower me and escape. "You really should've come up with a better person to rob today. You should consider a better line of work next time. Something less dangerous. Because attacking Preventers officers on the way to their cars isn't the smartest thing in the world."


	13. First Trace of a Shadow

"Your car… smells like gunpowder," I say, sliding into the passenger seat.

"It happens. I keep guns in here." Her words are clipped, formal and distant.

"Not normally. Are you ok?" She tightens her hands on the steering wheel and pulls out of the waiting parking lot.

"Buckle your seatbelt."

I do so, and we drive off. The appointment is at the same hospital that Trowa is staying at, and she murmurs something about going to visit him during my appointment. "You spend a lot of time mourning for people, don't you?" I ask, aloud. She does not respond. "Do you mourn for me, Sai Lei?"

"What good would that do me?" she asks, stiffly.

The rest of the drive through traffic passes in silence and the two of us do not speak. She parks, jamming the gear shift of the car into place, and we climb out of the car. I glance around, still not quite able to read the signs, and I feel her beside me. She might be quite upset with me, she might hate me… but she still cares about me.

She slips a hand through my arm, almost casually, and we head inside. Shrugging out of our jackets in the waiting room, she slips her gloves off and stuffs them into the pocket of her jacket. I catch her hand, and she struggles for a moment, fingers flexing, before she accepts it.

We head up to collect the out-patient paperwork, and I run my fingers along her palm. She stiffens slightly, her voice clipped as she asks the nurse for the proper papers, and is handed the clipboard. I do not say anything, until we return to the couches that are waiting for people who are filling things out.

"Your palms are scraped."

"Yeah," she says in a closed voice, tugging her hand back to pick up the pen attached to the clipboard and start to fill out the paperwork for me. "What's your birthday again?"

"What happened last night after you left?" I ask, taking the pen from her.

She looks at me for a long moment. "Nothing," her voice is cold, distant. She's pushing me away with it, just the way that I did to her last night.

"Sai Lei," I start to say, but know as I do that I'll never finish the sentence.

"Sally, Wufei," the voice belongs to Quatre. She hands me the clipboard and stands, giving him a hug. "Have you been up yet?"

The cruelest thing that was done since Trowa got into the hospital, I feel, was when Quatre's wife forbade him to see Trowa in person while he's like this. The scandal, probably. Trowa never wrote off Quatre from the last of kin forms we filled out years ago. Quatre will be the one to tell the doctors when it's time to give up on him.

But he hasn't been up to the hospital room in nearly a week.

And I can only think of one reason why.

Elise Muran-Winner.

His wife, and the future mother of his child.

Likely the only one this particular Winner will ever have. But his sisters are more than filling the gene pool with them, so there's little problem in that regard.

"No. I'm just getting Wufei's paperwork filled out. He's got an appointment."

"Ah," I feel Quatre fidgeting. I do not know what to say to him and I know that he wants to ask something, but doesn't feel right about it.

I won't be the one to suggest that he fills out the paperwork while Sally goes upstairs. That would seem like I was dismissing her. And I do not want her dismissed.

"Actually, Quatre, I'm sure you can fill this out with him… I'll head up and see Trowa now. If that's ok?" she turns to me.

I reach out a hand to her. Not the one with the clipboard, but the empty one, and she steps over, slightly, to take it. "You are kind to him."

"It happens," she says, leaning down over where I am seated to brush my forehead with a kiss. Then she turns and heads towards the elevator banks. Quatre takes a seat beside me.

"She loves you."

"I agree. Thank you for stating the obvious." He starts to fill out the paperwork.

"I just thought that maybe you would want to talk about it."

"My policy number is…"

"Obviously I was wrong."

I cannot talk to you about it, Quatre. Not if I cannot talk to her about it.


	14. Waking the Dead 1

Halfway up in the elevator, I lean back against the wall of it, and close my eyes, swallowing against my raw throat. I've been crying, silently, since last night. It hurts to have to be this strong, sometimes. I feel the tears burning my eyes, and they start to flow, silently.

"Your floor, ma'am," a polite voiced orderly says. I nod and step out, keeping my eyes closed most of the way as I head towards Trowa's room. I nod to the nurse on duty and she signs me in herself.

I'm here that often.

Inside his room, it is quiet. The blip of his heart monitor is all that makes noise. He breathes on his own. I sit down in the chair by his bed.

"Hey, Trowa. Bet you're not surprised to find me here again, huh?" No response, as usual. "I bet you're surprised to find me crying this time, though." I lean back in the chair. "I… almost got mugged last night. I know this isn't something that you're supposed to worry about, but I needed to tell someone, and you were the only person I felt I could. The guy was waiting in the parking garage downstairs from Wufei's apartment and I guess I was the lucky one. He pulled a gun on me, and I thought I was going to die. I stopped thinking. I don't know how you guys managed that on a daily basis during the war because all I wanted to do at that point was lay down and let him do it. I know it's wrong, but I wanted to just let that be the end of it all."

I brush a few strands of my hair back from my face.

"I guess that's how you feel about Quatre, isn't it? Why you said that Wufei would make it back to me like you weren't planning to come back yourself. You had something back here, Trowa, something better than Jean to come back to. I know, now, why you didn't accept it as readily as you might have. Things are the same way between me and Fei, now. I love him but I… I can't stand to be with him right now. He hides things." I stand, heading over to the window, and glance out. There are no bars on things on this floor, and it doesn't open to let in fresh air.

The scent of hospitals is familiar to me, and yet at the same time it sickens me. He shouldn't be in here.

"Damn it, Trowa, you need to get out of bed! I'm tired of this. I'm tired of coming here and leaving him to see you. I have no one to talk to but you and you're in coma. I'm tired of having to do this alone, to think things through like this. I'm tired of watching Quatre's eyes look so lost downstairs, and wondering why Jean hasn't been in to see you at all. He hasn't, you know. But Quatre's been waiting downstairs. For weeks. I'm tired of everyone being sick, and there being nothing I can do about it."

I take a deep breath, forcing back the tears that are suddenly welling up in my eyes. This is so much like my father, and yet not. "But it's not like that," my voice waivers in my own ears, I can only imagine what I sound like. Some weak woman, probably. "I know what you're thinking, that it's her that's keeping him down there, but it's not. I don't think he can bear to come up here. I don't think I can anymore either. But I do, and it's for him. Because whatever's between you and Quatre you love each other and that's worth something."

The heart monitor makes a different blip and I turn towards it.

There's a raspy chuckle from the bed that draws my eyes back there to Trowa. "Didn't know… guilt tripping… coma patients… was supposed to … be … treatment," he sputters.

I step over to him, dashing the tears from my own eyes, and click the call button for the nurse. "You're worse than Wufei," I say, taking his hand in my own.

"Maybe," he says, gagging a little.

"Don't try to talk, you've got a tube down your throat. It's been there a while."

He rolls his eyes.

I glance at the clock. "The nurse will be here shortly, I've got to go and meet Wufei downstairs. His appointment was only for half an hour."

"Be… patient… with him, Sally. He's … still learning." That's the second time Trowa's said that to me. It's still true. But right now I don't really care.

"Right, Trowa," I say as cheerfully as I can manage. I turn and head out the door, passing the nurse, and head for the elevators.

In the lobby, I find Wufei waiting, seated in the waiting room with his jacket folded across his lap. And mine is sitting in a chair next to him. His hair is loose around his face and his hands are folded on top of the coat. As I cross, he stands, and lifts my jacket to offer it to me.

His hands brush my collar as he helps me into it, and I shiver. "How did it go?"

"There will be treatment," he says in that haughty, over-important voice. But the hand that seeks mine is still tentative, and I know that he's scared by the idea of it.

"Laser surgery?"

He nods, and I lead him out of the lobby, the prior evening's fight virtually forgotten in the face of his timidity. We reach the car, his hand steadying me across the lingering ice as much as I am guiding him in his partial sight, and he pulls me up against him, holding me tight around the waist.

"Fei," I say softly after a long moment, but he isn't listening. "Fei, what is it?"

"I'm sorry I can't tell you what you need to know about me. That I can't… be open enough for you. It's not that I don't want to… that I want to keep you at arm's length like this." He's being open, and he puts his cheek against mine, and keeps whispering, "I want to."

"I never thought any different," I reply, knowing it's true. "I believed you, when you said…" but I can't finish the sentence.

"That I love you," he finishes for me after a moment. That's true, and the grip that he has on my waist is only the physical proof of it, I know. I lean my forehead on his shoulder and inhale deeply the scent of his coat. Green tea and tiger's balm. Reassurance.

His lips brush my cheek.

I should say back to him what I already know is true. What I've known for months is true. I should tell him that this isn't one-sided and that I love him just as much as he loves me, but something makes me hold back. Something keeps me from opening my lips and spilling my heart out to him as easily as he has just broken with me about his own reticence to speak.

And perhaps it is his reticence to speak that keeps me from blurting out what I think he needs to hear.

"Let's get in the car," I say, closing my eyes against the harshness in my own voice. He hugs me tighter for a moment, and kisses my cheek, as much contact as I've had with him since he came back. A hug and a kiss on the cheek. More than I ever had before he was away, before I went to China.

"As you say," he says, letting me go finally, reluctantly, and brushing his fingers on the car to keep his place as he rounds it.


	15. Blind Sight

Once Trowa woke up, Quatre forgot about the rest of us. He once again went into the hospital room, and Sally slowly stopped visiting as much. The third specialist was able to reverse the damage to my eyes, or at least partially, but the treatments were painful and I was forced to stay in the hospital for several weeks.

I was unsurprised when she didn't visit me much while I was there.

She came twice. And I remember both times exactly.

The first time, she stood in the doorway for a long time. I thought that she was a nurse passing by, because my eyes were bandaged against the light in the room, but then she took a step inside, and the noise of her feet was not that of a sneakered nurse in scrubs. She stepped carefully over to the bed, and I could smell her. She smelled like green tea and vanilla candles.

"Are you awake?" she asked softly.

"Sai Lei?" I said in response.

She pulled a chair over, I could tell by the scraping of the wood on the floor, and sat down, reaching up to take my hand in hers. "I'm sorry," she said, pressing her forehead to the back of my hand.

"For what?"

"Not visiting you before." Her voice broke.

"Does it remind you of visiting your father?" I asked in a gentle voice, as gentle as I could manage. I wanted to sit up and put my arms around her. To tell her that it was all right. But I was half afraid to. I had told her what needed to be said, and she had no response for it, other than her continued presence. By all rights, I should not have offered anything more.

She nodded, and I could feel the heat of her face as it flushed, but not from blushing. I turned my hand over and could feel the tears in her eyes. But 'all rights' do not include the heart. I gave in right there, and sat up, drawing her into my arms. She didn't resist, as she had when she dropped off my things from the apartment, and she leaned heavily against me, burying her face in my pajama shirt.

I stroked her hair with a gentle hand, and she put her arms around me.

A nurse walking by coughed and cleared her throat at us. Sally turned her face towards the woman, leaning her head back slightly. "That sort of behavior is not appropriate in a hospital."

Sally started to stutter, but I cut her off. I knew which nurse it was at that moment, by her high and mighty attitude, and the tone of her voice. "Leave us," I snapped.

"Mr. Chang, I do not care if-"

"That was not a request, Nurse Long."

She cleared her throat and stepped out of the doorway, but it was enough of a distraction to break the spell. Sally pulled away from me, and I heard her shuffling with her coat. "Visiting hours are almost over anyway. I just… I needed to see you, and be sure that you were all right."

"Don't let the bandages frighten you," I said, hoping to be helpful.

"There's a forty percent chance that you'll go blind from the laser surgery, Fei." She reached over and brushed a hand against my forehead. "But that's not what I'm worried about." She pulled her hand back and I heard her put her coat on. "Your window garden should be started soon… what do you plant in it?"

But it was her parting question, because she closed the door behind her.

The second time was what convinced me that she came to visit more often than when I was awake. I slept a lot, worn out by the anesthetic and the treatment they used on me. It was after one of the more exacting surgeries, and they had just finished bandaging my eyes. I had only just been wheeled into the room when I caught the scent of her circulating in the stale air of the hospital.

The door closed and she stepped over to the bed and took my hand. "Did it hurt?" her voice was very compassionate, very caring, and very soft. I thought, for a moment, she was a dream.

"Pain killers were injected into me." It hurt to turn my eyes, I wanted to fall asleep so that I didn't have to try any more, but her hand kept me awake. I wanted to be awake with her. I spend much of my time asleep with her, before the hospitalization and during it, I now realized. I had dreamed her a hundred times in the three weeks, but this was enough to prove to me that they had not all been dreams.

"But you have a high tolerance for them."

"It was a new one," I murmured, tugging against her hand.

She obliged me, and leaned down. Her hair was down, which suggested something to me that my fogged mind could not put its finger on. It brushed against my face. She reached up with her free hand and adjusted my askew pajama top, redoing a poorly done up front with careful fingers.

"I'm not supposed to be here," she said, leaning a little closer to kiss my cheek. "I've gotto go before that Nurse Long decides to check on you again."

"Don't go just yet," I said. "It feels like a dream."

"Maybe it's better if you think of it that way, Fei," she said, running her free, cool hand along my warm face. "Get some rest."

And then she was gone. And I am still unsure if she was really there or not.

But today the bandages come off. And I am still not sure if I will be able to see, let alone drive a car that isn't here. So either she will be here, or one of the other Preventers will be, to take me home.

I'm still required to rest, and I have outpatient checkups scheduled for the next month, and a pair of dark sunglasses waiting for me. But none of it matters. The door is opened and I hear a familiar pair of sneakers.

"Today's the day, Mr. Chang."

I did not let the Nurse call me by my first name, it was something she wanted too badly, a familiarity I couldn't handle with her. Something that Meiran would have disapproved of, unlike Sai Lei, whom I am sure she would have smiled at. The two women might have been friends, if it were not for my weakness.

"That it is." I am sitting up in my bed, and I can feel things in the room. The light coming in the window, the magnetism of the monitors around my bed, the uncomfortable cushion of the hospital bed beneath me.

"No one has shown up yet to take you home, but the doctor will be in shortly to take your bandages off."

"You're meddling again."

"I'm trying to look after your well being, Mr. Chang, despite your efforts to the contrary. You will need a way home."

The door opens behind her, and I hear the doctor's footsteps. They are not alone. "I will indeed need a way home," I reply.

"You have one." If I hadn't smelled her as the door entered, I would have known her in the instant she spoke. I can feel the frown in her voice and the bristle in the nurse's. "I was just having a conversation with your doctor, Wufei, I didn't think you would mind me being tardy, under the circumstances."

I am tempted to reach out a hand to her, and I do. She steps over to the bed, leaning down to kiss my cheek, and stays when I clasp the hand she puts in mine. There's a chuckle in her voice as she says to the doctor, "Is it time?"

"We could have done it this morning," the doctor, whom I have come to find is a very competent man, one that I trust, "but I wanted to wait until there was something familiar for him to see. Nurse… Long and I are not faces he would recognize. Some patients," he is rounding the bed and taking a pair of scissors from his pocket, "find the renewal of full-sight to be disorienting. A familiar, friendly face is something I make procedure to having around to comfort them."

The warm wrap of the bandages is slowly snipped and pulled away. Sally's palms are sweating, and she threads her fingers through mine. The cool air on my eyelids makes them twitch.

"Feel free to open your eyes, Mr. Chang."

I do, and at first the light is blinding, and I close my eyes again.

But then, with the encouragement of Sally's hand in mine, and the steady thrump thrump of the blood through the veins of her palm, I open them again, slowly. The room, off-colored at first, is tinted green from the fluorescents as I glance around, seeing the three people peering intently at me.

Nurse Long, exactly as I expected her, with her straight black hair pulled tightly back into a bun high on her head. Her pale complexion looks sallow in the light of the hospital, and is as unforgiving as she is. Then the doctor, Jonas Gray, with his youthful and competent expression, despite the graying of his hair and the wrinkle lines of his forehead and near his eyes.

Then my eyes rest on Sally, and I forget, for the moment, that there is anyone else in the room. The long fall of her dark blond hair is shiny in the light of the dreary room. Her complexion, as opposed to the nurse's, is healthy, but her expression is strained. Her eyes are worried.

"Sai Lei," I say, lifting a hand to her cheek. "How I have missed seeing you."

Tears brim in her eyes, and she leans forward, putting her arms around me, holding me close and pressing her face against my neck.

Nurse Long starts to speak up, a frown on her face, but I narrow my eyes at her. Dr. Gray laughs slightly and bustles her out of the room. "You know where your clothing is. I'll make sure to have the check out papers brought in for you."

I nod, and he closes the door behind him.

I stroke Sally's hair, and she trembles. "You were afraid," I say softly. She nods. "Sai Lei," I start to chide.

"There's nothing to chide me about," she murmurs against my neck. "There was a real chance you'd go blind."

"I have been through worse," I say.

"But that's just the point. You shouldn't have to go through anything, not now. Pardon me if I'm a little more concerned about you than you seem to be for yourself. But you," and by that word I know that she means the five of us and not me, "deserve better. This danger… this needless risk… it's not worth it."

"Why do _you _stay with the Preventers, Sally?"

The question throws her, and she sits back in her chair, just slightly, still perched gracefully on the edge of it. She swallows, "I-"

"It is not as easy as it seems, is it? Explaining away what you do. I am not like Heero, or Duo, or Quatre… or even Trowa. All of them were raised differently than I was. They do not have the same sense of justice that I do."

"Your sense of justice has a habit of almost getting you killed, if you remember."

"But it is all that has been with me for most of my life. It is something _my_ family believed in. And no matter what else there is about them, I have believed what they believed since I was young."

She lowers her head, staring at her lap. "We're not so different," she says in a soft voice. "Except that my father hated me being in the war. Hated me being in danger."

"It is different, for women." She glances up sharply, challenge in her eyes. "For women in the eyes of the men who care for them," I explain. "It would be as easy for your father to admit that he could not provide for you… as to let you go to war. But I am sure that he would have been proud of you for being so strong."

"He was," she says, leaning down across her lap.

There is a long silence in which the hum of the room overtakes the rest of the noise in the world of the hospital room.

"So what happens now?" I ask, reaching over to take her hand in mine. As Dr. Gray predicted, my eyes feel tired.

"We go home," she says.

"Not entirely what I meant," I say, tipping her head up to meet my eyes. "Sally, you have been avoiding me."

"Yes," she admits, reaching over with her free hand to pick the dark sunglasses off the table and hand them to me. When I give her a slightly puzzled look, she arches a brow and says, "Your eyes aren't healed completely. Light can be damaging." She sounds as if she knows this, as though she is an optometrist, an eye doctor and practicing for years. "But I don't think that's as important as getting you home, right now."

"This is more that is important than that," I say, letting her drop my hand as she heads over towards the closet to get my clothing out. "Sally, this can't continue."

"You're a hard man to have love you, Wufei," she says in a soft voice, bringing the clothing over and laying it on the bed. "I can't do more than I am right now." She meets my eyes and there's a sadness in them. She's starting to realize how much I hide from her. She's starting to know.

There is no use in pretending I don't understand.

I nod, lowering my head slightly. This is how things will be then. Again.

I am surprised to find her hand on my cheek. "But I can be a patient woman, when I have to be." I look up into her eyes, and she tips the glasses up on my forehead a moment to brush her cool fingers across my eyes, which close obligingly for her hand. Then she leans forward slightly and kisses my lips. "I'll be out in the hall."

* * *

There is something truly frustrating about all of this. I am alone and in love. I am connected to him, and yet cut off from him. And the worst part about it is there isn't anyone for me to talk to about it. Not since Quatre started seeing Trowa again. I've been afraid to go to his room for fear I would interrupt something. I step out into the hallway, closing the door behind me, and lean against the wall.

Nurse Long is staring at me through the open doorway. Jealousy is in her eyes and I can't take that right now, so I close my eyes and look up at the ceiling. She reminds me of one of the women that one of my father's arranged dates for me ended up with. I used to see them around town, when mother and I would go into town for supplies and to escape the men in the house.

The particular boy that this girl was dating, Shenglun was the girl's name, I don't remember his full name… he introduced himself to me as Da, and I remember he had really liked me. Whenever mother and I ran into them, he would always greet me warmly, formally, and I recall the same look in Shenglun's eyes as the look in Nurse Long's. She wasn't happy that he showed me such respect and reverence. I don't think I really blame her. I didn't ask for it, and I didn't want it. But the look on Nurse Long's face is too much. Right now it is just too much.

The noise of sneakers announces her entrance into the hall, and she comes up to me. I can smell the medicine on her. I never smelled like that when I worked in a hospital. "I don't approve of you," she says in a thinly veiled voice. She doesn't disapprove of me. She hates me.

"I'm aware," I reply, opening my eyes to look up at her. She has a clean, pale complexion and black hair. But her eyes are green. Not quite so traditional after all, are we, Nurse Long?

"You don't do Mr. Chang any good."

"And you do? Do you even know my name?" A faint blush colors her cheeks, as though she hadn't expected to be so rebuked by me. She can't be even Wufei's age, and she's acting like his guardian. I straighten up off the wall, the way I used to when Shenglun would glare at me challengingly. "You don't, do you? Because he wouldn't tell you."

She bristles, straightening herself and gathering the clipboard against her chest more firmly. "You're very impolite."

"You're very presumptuous." I hold out my hand for the clipboard. It's his release papers, I'm almost positive. She narrows her eyes at me. "He will need to sign them." I do not add that so will I, as his next of kin. That might put the wrong idea in her head.

But what's the right idea? I haven't been more than a sister to him, even if he does claim that he loves me. No. That's unfair and unkind. If Wufei says that he loves me, he does. Because he wouldn't be like that. Whatever else I think of him, whatever else I believe of him, he is not like that. He hates that sort of thing in other people, and so he would not do it himself.

If he said something, like that, to me, then he meant it.

I am not quite sure I am even afraid to think of the exact words he used.

Which is really why I haven't told him how I feel about him. I don't want to say something I'm not sure of. Nurse Long waivers, clutching the clipboard as though she doesn't want to give it to me because it will mean that I have him how she doesn't. I know the feeling.

I felt that way about a dead woman.

The door opens behind me, and Wufei is threading his fingers through his hair and pulling it back out of his face. Nurse Long hands me the clipboard, almost throwing it at me, and turns to walk quickly down the hall. Shenglun used to do the same thing, retreat quickly whenever Da would enter a room and we were facing off. "Ready?" I ask him.

"Blasted hair."

"It's getting longer," I say, handing him the clipboard.

He gives up trying to fix his hair from his face and scribbles the characters of his name into the release form, handing it back. "You have to sign too."

"I know," I reply, glancing over the paperwork before signing where I'm supposed to. "We have to get you a wheelchair at the nurse's station. And an aide to wheel you out."

"Not necessary," Dr. Gray says. I turn to find the man offering a patient smile. He pushes a wheelchair towards us. "I'm sure you'll see him out well, Miss Po. You can leave the chair at the desk downstairs."

"Thank you, Doctor." Wufei offers the man a slight bow and lowers himself into the chair. Once, he might have protested. Once, he might have fought the idea of being an invalid. Once, he might have refused the wheelchair.

I offer the doctor a smile, handing him the clipboard, and step around to push the chair towards the elevator banks. "Have you seen Trowa lately?"

"Not in a week," I respond. "He's asked to have no visitors."

"I'm sure that will change."

"I don't think so." The doors open and I push him inside, turning him around before pressing the lobby button. "He wrote Quatre off his last of kin form and I don't know who he put on it. But he hasn't been talking to anyone from the office."

"I think he will see you, if you call to ask him if you can come."

I hadn't thought about that. I don't know why Wufei has. "Why… why do you think that? Why mention it now?"

"Everyone needs someone to talk to, Sally."

There he goes again. "It should be you." He doesn't respond. I suck in a breath. "Who do you talk to? Not me."

"I am … not everyone," his voice is tired, weary, and I can feel the sadness in him, the sadness that makes my skin itch. The sadness that makes me want to wrap him up inside me and soothe away whatever memory keeps hurting him so that he can't open up.

But I can't.

The doors open on the lobby and I push him out. "The car's in the far lot. Wait here and I'll go get it. It's still cold out."

He catches my hand. "May I come with you?"

He knows.

He knows. He knows. He knows. And he wants to make it work, I think. He's trying to give me the space that I need to think it through but without letting me push him away completely.

"It'll only take a minute."

"I'll wait then." He will be a tender lover, if we ever manage it.

I leave him, retrieve my coat from the rack and button it up, pulling my gloves on as I step through the doors and out into the chill. It's not really cold. It's damp, muggy, and chill. There's fog outside and I don't doubt there will be rain. But it's turning to spring now, and things could always be worse. I walk smoothly, not a run and not a slow pace, and find the car.

He loves me.

I open it and climb in, spending a while staring at my ghosted reflection in the dirty windshield.

He won't touch me.

I put the key in the ignition.

He's not lying, but there's some reason that he won't. And I don't have to settle for that. He's not the only man in the world. I've dated other men. Not recently, but I have. I turn the key over. Just because one man loves me doesn't mean that it's the end of my searching. If he can't open up and let me in… I don't just want Wufei the mind.

I'm almost ashamed to admit it, but I also want Wufei the man.

And I'm not a hormonal teenager anymore. Not the way I was in the wars, when my thoughts wavered only between my purpose and the intensity of the pilots I was infatuated with. I back out of the parking space carefully and turn towards the front entrance. It takes much less time to get there when you're on wheels.

He stands and steps through the entrance, and I unlock the door. He opens it, settling into the seat as though he belongs there, and has never been anywhere but there. I settle myself, hoping to have at least part of his calm, and pull off.


End file.
